Patent search and patent examination to be outsourced, and the start date for filing a request for examination to be changed

On December 27 2019, the government submitted a draft federal law «Amendments to the Civil Code» (No. 873108-7) to the State Duma. At present, patent search and patent examination are carried out only by the Russian PTO. The proposed revisions are aimed, inter alia, at creating conditions for the Russian scientific and educational organizations accredited by the Russian PTO under which they could conduct a preliminary patent search and patentability assessment of the claimed technical solution. This service will be provided to the applicants at their request. The cost of the service will be determined by the organizations in contracts concluded with the applicants. Besides, the draft law proposes to give the government the right to determine the number of applications that can be submitted by one applicant without paying a fee if he files a declaration to surrender a patent, if granted, to any person. Currently, the number of such applications is not limited. The draft law also stipulates that if an international application is filed, the three-year period for filing a request for substantive examination of the application should be calculated from the date of transfer of the international application into the national stage, and if the Eurasian application is filed – from the date of conversion of the Eurasian application into the Russian national application. At present, the law provides that the start date of the three-year period is the filing date of the international application or the filing date of the Eurasian application respectively. On June 10, the bill was adopted by the State Duma in the first reading.